Want to Buy All ‘The 12 Days of Christmas’ Gifts in Real Life? It’ll Cost You Over $46K

Have you ever wondered how much it would cost to buy all the presents from “The 12 Days of Christmas” in real life? This year the price is higher than ever.

An estimated $46,729.86 would cost to buy all 78 gifts from the classic English carol, according to PNC Financial Services’ 2023 Christmas Price Index, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary. That’s a 2.7% increase over last year’s total of $45,523.27, according to CNN and Forbes.

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However, the true cost of “The 12 Days of Christmas” in 2023 is even more staggering “when you count every repetition of the song,” according to PNC. When all 364 gifts are taken into account, the total is a whopping $201,972.66. Last year, the actual cost was also incredibly high, at $197,071.09 per Forbes.

“Even with its small basket of goods and services, the PNC Christmas Price Index is not immune to rising costs in the broader U.S. economy,” PNC said.

Stock image of a Christmas gift.

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The Christmas Price Index was created in 1984 as “a fun way to measure consumer spending and trends in the economy,” according to PNC. Similar to the US Consumer Price Index, the Christmas Price Index measures changes in the prices of goods mentioned in a popular song.

The first Christmas price index showed that gifts would cost $20,069.58. Since then, the Christmas price index has risen 133%, compared with a 191% rise in the consumer price index over the same time period, according to PNC.

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Every gift has seen a price increase, although some have seen more dramatic price changes than others. For example, the price for “10 lords a-leapin'” has risen from $2,903 in 1984 to $11,635 in 2023.

The biggest change between 2022 and 2023 was the price of “two turtledoves,” which rose 25% from $600 to $750, according to Forbes. The price of the “pear” also increased significantly, by 15% from $260 to $299.

Picture of European turtledoves.

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But the price of the most expensive item, “seven swans”, remained relatively unchanged. In 1984, that item would have cost you $13,120.86 — and in 2023, it costs $13,125. (PNC attributes this to “a successful domestic trumpeter swan breeding program, which caused swan prices to drop by 50% in 1995.)

However, the price of “six laying geese” is up 8% from last year’s price of $720 to $780. The price of “11 Bagpipers Playing” ($3,207.38) and “12 Drummer Drums” ($3,468.02) saw similar price growth, rising 6% per piece over their 2022 total prices.

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In that regard, rising costs between 2022 and 2023 contrast with a dramatic increase between 2021 and 2022, in which the cost of “12 Days of Christmas” gifts rose 10.5%, according to CNN and Forbes.

For reference, the average American earned $37,638 in 2021, according to the US Census website. The median household income at the time was $69,021.

Picture of a group of swans swimming on a lake on a snowy winter morning.

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Services today cost much more than goods, which PNC said is “a reversal from 40 years ago, when [the price of] the goods were much greater than the services.”

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“We’re starting to see that the level of inflation is somewhat under control,” Amanda Agati, chief investment officer at PNC’s asset management group, told CNN.

“But just like in the broader economy,” she added, “the Christmas price index did not return to the Fed’s long-term target of 2%.”

Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education